Chicagoan pleads guilty to role in Mumbai terror attacks

A U.S. citizen of Pakistani descent pleaded guilty Thursday to charges alleging he scouted targets before the coordinated terrorist attacks in Mumbai, India, in 2008 that killed 166 people, including six Americans. David Coleman Headley, 49 and of Chicago, also acknowledged in U.S. District Court that he scouted targets for a never-carried-out attack on Denmark's Jyllands Posten newspaper, which published unflattering cartoons about the prophet Mohammed. In return for Headley's cooperation and testimony against co-defendant Tahawwur Hussain Rana, a Chicago businessman of Pakistani descent also charged in both plots, the Justice Department agreed not to seek the death penalty for Headley.

"Jihad Jane" plea: Colleen LaRose, 46, of Pennsburg, Pa., accused of trolling the Internet as "Jihad Jane," denied in a Philadelphia court Thursday that she sought to kill a Swedish artist targeted by radical Muslims or agreed to marry a terrorism suspect to help him get travel documents.

LOS ANGELES

Court lets decision on Ashcroft stand

The full Western appeals court voted Thursday to let stand its September decision that former U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft is not immune from a civil action charging that he violated Kansas-born Muslim convert Abdullah Kidd's constitutional rights. Ashcroft had petitioned the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for rehearing of his claim of immunity. Kidd, a former University of Idaho running back, claims Ashcroft's policy of using material witness warrants to detain those suspected of terrorist ties subjected him to unreasonable search and seizure and denied him due process of law.

Elsewhere

San Diego: The wife of a Marine captain pleaded guilty Thursday to income tax evasion in a scheme in which the couple allegedly skimmed $1.75 million from contracts to supply equipment to troops in Iraq. Janet Schmidt, 39, is set to be sentenced June 7. Her husband, Capt. Eric Schmidt, 39, is set to appear in court April 2.

New York: A wealthy Manhattan investment banker who was once a top fundraiser for Hillary Rodham Clinton and other Democrats pleaded guilty Thursday to bank fraud. Hassan Nemazee, 60, was charged last year with using fake collateral to obtain $290 million in loans from major banks.

El Paso, Texas: American law enforcement agents cracked down Thursday on the notorious Barrio Azteca gang in an attempt to determine whether its heavily armed members were behind the shooting deaths of three people connected to the U.S. consulate in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, over the weekend. Fifty members of the gang were arrested.

Central Falls, R.I.: A teacher at a failing school where he and all his colleagues are being fired hung an effigy of President Barack Obama in his classroom, apparently in reaction to Obama's support of tough accountability measures in schools. The teachers union on Thursday condemned the effigy.